In U.S. school districts, African American special-education students are disciplined more heavily than other students. This case study examined how a suburban high school district in Southern California addressed disproportionality and significant disproportionality in the discipline of African American students with disabilities. The study…

A gap in research exists that demonstrates how principals use their authority to make decisions and how that intersects with change management models. The purpose of the study is to examine how one elementary school principal has led change and how teachers perceive the effectiveness of the change. The study seeks to explore principal's and…

Colleges and universities are being increasingly recognized as key contributors to the well-being of the places in which they are located. However, in spite of the promise and potential of place-based engagement, there is little agreement about what place and place-building means or how these concepts can be operationalized in within the context…

A new superintendent in a new school district (NSND) can be a challenging position. The literature review asserts that many challenges faced by NSNDs are due to the absence of a shared vision. Challenges can be listed as work stoppage, personnel, financial, fighting ghosts, homecoming procession and many other aspects of running a district.…

As district- and school-level leaders face increasing pressure from federal, state, and local accountability mandates there has been increased dependence on using and analyzing student data to help improve student performance. While the reporting of disaggregated data by student subgroup confirms that achievement gaps exist, it does not provide…

Many higher education institutions have implemented online learning (OL) as a response to students' needing greater access to higher education. Although many universities have determined that meeting this increasing need for OL is important to their future strategies, some universities do not know how to structure their internal operations to…

The purpose of this study is to answer the question: How do pilot users of the Danielson Evaluation System perceive this model in two mid-south high schools? The study describes the perceptions of teachers and administrators who implemented the Danielson Teacher Evaluation Model. The primary focus was on teachers and administrators experience with…

The purpose of this study was to explore the merits of three conceptual frameworks that emerged from a synthesis of literature related to globalization, mission, and higher education. The first framework, higher education and mission, included three frames: important, not important, and emergent. The second framework, globalization and higher…

Secondary school department chairs are content area specialists in their schools and are responsible for providing students with the most appropriate curricula. However, most secondary school department chairs have limited authority to institute change unilaterally (Gmelch, 1993; Hannay & Erb, 1999). To explore how these educational leaders…

Sustainability is the promotion of high performance, healthful, energy-efficient, and environmentally stable buildings. Buildings intended for sustainable certification must meet guidelines developed by the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) of the U.S. Green Building Council. The problem is that LEED certification often fails to…

Attrition is a problem among special education teachers in an urban high school in a southern part of the United States. A high school special education department served as the local setting. The department was unique due to a high teacher attrition rate and high percentage of teachers with less than five years of teaching experience. The purpose…

This two-phase exploratory study examined department chairs' perspectives of online learning in a California community college district and examined if differences existed in This two-phase exploratory study examined department chairs' perspectives of online learning in a California community college district and examined if differences existed in…

This embedded multiple-case study addressed the lack of qualitative research on the contributions of principal leadership behaviors and organizational routines in Montana's distinguished Title I schools. This study was guided by the research question, "How do principal leadership behaviors and organizational routines contribute to the high…

The purpose of the 1990 apostolic constitution on Catholic higher education entitled "Ex Corde Ecclesiae" (From the Heart of the Church) is to emphasize the dual relationship Catholic institutions have to the academic community as well as the Church. The concepts of Catholicism and university are not to be experienced as polarizing…

This study examined an elementary school, located in an urban school district, which was labeled as a Persistently Low-Achieving School (PLAS) by the federal government in 2009 in order to determine how the school planned to change leadership and staff; increase student achievement; and implement new approaches for changes in school climate. The…